Papa John Dumped By Another University

Papa John Schnatter is most closely associated with the University of Louisville, but he also had an economic center at Purdue University named after him back in April of this year, when his John H. Schnatter Family Foundation reportedly pledged $8 million towards the school’s effort “to beef up hiring at the center over the next six years.”

This week that short-lived partnership reportedly came to an end, when Purdue’s trustees voted Friday morning to strip the pizza man’s name from the economic center and offer to return his donation, at least $1 million of which had already been received by the university. Per the :

“The Purdue Board of Trustees has decided that the name of the university’s economics center, named in April 2018 the John H. Schnatter Center for Economic Research at Purdue, should revert to the Purdue University Research Center in Economics. Purdue will offer to return the funds associated with the naming.”

“The board believes this action is necessary to avoid distraction from the center’s work, counterproductive division on the campus, and any inference of any deviation from the university’s often stated stance on tolerance and racial relations.”

The money was slated to “support faculty hiring,” and was acknowledged with “elaborate signs featuring Schnatter’s name” at the center. The signs have reportedly been removed from the center, and his name is now nowhere to be found on the center’s webpage.